90gal wave tank

im wondering if it would be better to drill the tank and do a sump or leave it and do hob items. does it make that much of a difference?

 

Yes it will make a big difference on what you are trying to do if you are trying to do any sort of reef I would highly recommend the sump design. It comes out much cleaner looking and you can have more system water volume that will really help make the system more stable overall.

I did HOB items for a long time on my 55 gallon and it work ok but I was always fighting algae and having to try and cram stuff into the tank and always hid pipes and tubes and pumps hanging off the back wall.

 

ok the only problem is i dont understand how all the pipes work and where to put the pumps and everything i could build it no problem if i had step by step instuctions but i cant find any.

 

It's simple really. I understand you are new to this, so I will draw something up really quickly to show you.

The blue line is your "overflow" this goes from your display tank down to your sump, where equipment is hidden away inside the aquarium cabinet. The one I drew shows the line splits. This is so you have the overflow go to the skimmer(mechanical filtration) section and the that hasn't been cleaned by the other.

Gravity will cause water to move downward - toward the middle of the sump - the return section.

The red line is your "return line", returning water back to the display tank, from the sump.

 

y would u let one side not get cleaned?

 

I'm sorry. I was typing and seem to have deleted part of the text by mistake.

I was saying that when thebreturn pump is in the middle, you have two forms of filtration...one on either side of the return. This way, both the skimmer and the refugium are constantly getting" dirty water" from the display tank and cleaning it, or ridding it of its bad proteins/nutrient(waste products).

 

could i have the water flow into the refug then thru the simmer then go back into the tank? bc then all the water would be cleaned by both not just half and half.

 

That's what I am saying. Either way you are still cleaning all the water. It is just a different way of doing it. I've seen both ways used for sumps and both work. Theoretically, the return in the middle is supposed to be better, so that is probably why it is such a popular design. But it is your personal preference though.

 

Someone correct me if I am wrong but I believe that you want the dirtiest water to go to both the refugium and the skimmer section so that the refugium gets the most nutrients to make it most effective and the skimmer is cleaning the dirtiest water. The main point is that the skimmer section can only filter so much water and the same goes for the refugium. If you split the water into two forms of filtration then you get the most filtration possible.

 

ok my next ? is how do i drill the holes?